


Out of the Past

by brinjal



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-09
Updated: 2016-09-09
Packaged: 2018-08-14 02:06:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7994677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brinjal/pseuds/brinjal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Noir/Hard-boiled Enemies AU where Gabriel snapped after his wife left, and everyone else felt that butterfly flap its wings. </p><p>Marinette finds something amiss in her shipment at the Agreste Boutique she works at and commits to finding out more. Adrien, however, never got the chance to go to public school but instead was forced to learn some pretty tough lessons at home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Out of the Past

  
The rain pelted down through the early Parisian morning. A young woman in her trench squinted her way through the crowds, turned down a back alley and kicked a half-crumpled can of coke off the doormat at the back of her workplace.

  
The door was slightly ajar.

  
She pushed it open and fought her way through the stacks of cardboard to the coat rack where her forgotten umbrella sat and her coworker’s olive raincoat was already hung up and dripping.

  
“Salut, Marinette!” Mylène, a quirky romantic and sensitive soul greeted her with a warm towel and a smile as the sodden trenchcoat was hung up to quicken the spread of the floor puddle.

  
“Thank you, Mylène.” She took the towel and dabbed her face, making a note to check her makeup, before squeezing water out of the pigtail at either shoulder.

  
“I’m just going to finish the order forms for next week, but we should be getting a box of raincoats this morning for restocking, so keep an ear on the back door before we open.” With this, the woman slipped back into the main shop, leaving Marinette to fish out her lighter and hopefully-dry pack of cigarettes.

  
It was a bad habit. An addiction that she didn’t need. The money could have been far better spent on fabric supplies and parts for her steadily-ageing sewing machine, but when you’re still living at home at 26 with no time for a love life, a second job and your online, custom fashion boutique isn’t getting enough action to make up for the lack of sleep it’s causing you, it’s nice to lean back, take a pull of that sweet, smooth smoke and feel nothing but the buzz.

  
Five minutes closer to a cancer-induced early death later, the cherry ending its journey to the filter all too fast, another butt joined its fallen brethren in a tray on the wet side of that alleyway door. She let the last puff of smoke out into the grey morning before turning around, the door letting a slight squeak in protest, to go back inside.

  
“Mademoiselle!” A voice cut through the rain, halting her turn halfway. “Please sign this quick. I’m illegally parked and this box is soaking through fast.” A man with a face more forgettable than a drunken Tinder quickie with a one-pump chump thrust a box up at her, its sides marked with the Gabriel logo, and a clipboard with attached pen dangling alongside it.

  
With an unusual amount of grace and dexterity (something she’d later attribute to the lingering effects of the nicotine high, if only so Alya would stop asking her to quit), Marinette took the box with one hand and scribbled what was probably just a sine curve on the signature line with the other before he swiped it away and ran off, leaving her to manoeuvre backwards through the precariously-balanced recycling and bins stuffed in the doorway with the sizeable package and slick shoes.

  
She noticed the cardboard flaps were loose in places, dampness causing the glue to lose effectiveness and Marinette’s jostling worsening matters. Lowering things to the floor sent her into a squat as she treated what was probably tens of thousands of Euros in designer rainwear dearer than a record-breaking weekend at a venison market.

  
She pried open the loose flap, taking care to edge her nails around the glue so none would get on her hands. Unfortunately, what lay in the box was not the replacement set of the spring rainwear collection, lovingly folded and wrapped in waterproof plastic. The glint that glared back at her was certainly no textile.

  
She took in a soft gasp, crouched low to the ground on that humid backroom floor and breathed one word:

  
“Merde.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hi. Thank you for reading.
> 
> The chapter title is a blues song that I felt fit this chapter very well. I hope you can feel the noir vibes whilst reading this. Also the idea of a Noir Chat Noir tickled me.
> 
> It would mean a lot to me if you left something behind.


End file.
